dbQwikSite V6 is on the way. As part of the release we are conducting a public Beta test where users can download the pre-release version and provide feedback to the development team about new features.
Anyone who wants to participate as a tester can download V6 BETA from the user forum
There is a thread available to record any issues and chat about new featured.
Official release dates for dbQwikSite production release is not available yet. The release date will depend on the outcome of the Beta test. We are targeting about 1 month for Beta testing.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
dbQwikSite V6 is on its way
Without a doubt the single most asked question I hear is: "When is version 6 coming?" The answer too often eludes me. But today I am happy to say... it's on the way.
After going through some staffing changes, version 6 took some hits in terms of both scope and delivery schedule. I have been avoiding answering that most prevalent question because, I just did not want to misguide our loyal user community. Amid all the forum rumors of the lack of delivery of new versions, I did not want to add to the confusion.
Truth be told we have been working on version 6 all along and it is shaping up for a release. Version 6 offers a range of new features that should make dbQwikSite generated web sites more powerful and flexible than ever before. The list is not yet finalized, as we try to squeeze in those last few features before freezing development to begin testing in earnest. V6 focus is on two areas, making pages more powerful for the end user and on design flexibility to allow designers greater control on the look of generated pages.
In the area of more powerful pages, look forward to: multiple categories, in-line edit/update, group actions against multiple selected records, new user controls, and enhanced search capabilities.
In the area of design you can expect to see: custom add/update form support, enhanced CSS classes, customizable HTML sections on all pages.
The above lists are not comprehensive, but should give you an idea of what to expect. As far as delivery dates, these will depend on testing results. Tomorrow is the date set to set the final scope and thus the development target deadline. After that some testing, and finally general release. It's hard to say exactly when these will occur, but stay tuned to this blog for news and updates.
Beyond V6. Many will note that V6 does not include true dot net code generation. That's because we wanted to do that right, and rather than shoehorning dot net functionality into the more classic paradigm of dbQwikSite generated pages, we decided to come out with an all-new version of dbQwikSite for dot net. That in no way infers that we are dropping PHP support. Quite the contrary, we are planning to migrate PHP into the same framework as the dot net product, leveraging a class oriented code generation in both languages. This will open new doors to PHP users, as well as Microsoft platform users who wish to extend and enhance dbQwikSite generated code.
After going through some staffing changes, version 6 took some hits in terms of both scope and delivery schedule. I have been avoiding answering that most prevalent question because, I just did not want to misguide our loyal user community. Amid all the forum rumors of the lack of delivery of new versions, I did not want to add to the confusion.
Truth be told we have been working on version 6 all along and it is shaping up for a release. Version 6 offers a range of new features that should make dbQwikSite generated web sites more powerful and flexible than ever before. The list is not yet finalized, as we try to squeeze in those last few features before freezing development to begin testing in earnest. V6 focus is on two areas, making pages more powerful for the end user and on design flexibility to allow designers greater control on the look of generated pages.
In the area of more powerful pages, look forward to: multiple categories, in-line edit/update, group actions against multiple selected records, new user controls, and enhanced search capabilities.
In the area of design you can expect to see: custom add/update form support, enhanced CSS classes, customizable HTML sections on all pages.
The above lists are not comprehensive, but should give you an idea of what to expect. As far as delivery dates, these will depend on testing results. Tomorrow is the date set to set the final scope and thus the development target deadline. After that some testing, and finally general release. It's hard to say exactly when these will occur, but stay tuned to this blog for news and updates.
Beyond V6. Many will note that V6 does not include true dot net code generation. That's because we wanted to do that right, and rather than shoehorning dot net functionality into the more classic paradigm of dbQwikSite generated pages, we decided to come out with an all-new version of dbQwikSite for dot net. That in no way infers that we are dropping PHP support. Quite the contrary, we are planning to migrate PHP into the same framework as the dot net product, leveraging a class oriented code generation in both languages. This will open new doors to PHP users, as well as Microsoft platform users who wish to extend and enhance dbQwikSite generated code.
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
dbQwikSite 5.4 Makes it a Joy to Deploy
Oh Boy… another deploy! This is what I always feel before trying to move a dbQwikSite database web site to a hosting server. I’ve got to worry about file folders, file transfers, connection strings, data base installs, file permissions and none of it is as easy as I would like it to be.
I’m not the only one that does not look forward to sorting out all the differences between my perfect PC test and some distant server looming out there in cyberspace. Users have been asking for help deploying for quite some time now. That time has arrived with the release of dbQwikSite version 5.4. They say necessity is the mother of invention, I say laziness is a close second. I therefore confess that my laziness is the driving force behind this most recent release. “Just make it easy for me.” was the mandate I gave to the development team. And about 6 weeks later I am happy to report that I can be lazy as I like and STILL get my site to deploy!
So what magic do we get in this version? The Highlights are: a new, smarter deploy wizard, a better more robust FTP, and on-line administrative pages. The new deploy wizard now is smarter a producing working connection strings for your host. The all new folder based file selection for deployment is a breeze to use. Say “bye-bye” to dbQwikFTP, I doubt too many users will shed a tear over that. Say “hello” to FileZilla (free open source) file transfer tool. Simply put, it just works better than the now depreciated dbQwikFTP. Smooth integration between the Deploy Wizard and FileZilla makes short work of file transfer; all I have to do is click the start the queue button and all my preselected folders are moved to the right place on my server. A cool feature at the end of deploy, let’s me launch my site in my browser for easy testing. One option is to launch the all new dbQwikSite “Site Admin” console. Arriving in the console, I can install MySQL tables if I had generated the scripts, I can see what scripting languages are supported on my server, I can troubleshoot connection strings. Neat, I think I like being lazy! This version make it much more of “a joy to deploy” my sites.
While the team worked hard to make sure I could be a real sloth, not every deployment task can be automated. So to accompany all this new software wizardry is the infamous “missing deployment guide”. It’s not missing anymore! You can access the new on-line deployment guide from the either the “Help” or “dbQwikHosting” menus.
There are other new features in 5.4 along with the regular batch of bug fixes. Details can be found in the release notes. Version 5.4 is a free upgrade for all version 5 users and is available via live-update.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Mashing it up with dbQwikSite
What is a Mashup? For me it conjures up images of a bunch of cooks, all mashing away at a pot of boiled potatoes. But in the world of web development it means piecing together discreet units of available web functionality into a single integrated application.
Wikipedia defines a mash up as:
Mashup (web application hybrid)
In technology, a mashup is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool; an example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data, thereby creating a new and distinct web service that was not originally provided by either source.
Before I say anything more let me show you are screen shot of something I was playing with in dbQwikSite before I looked up the term in Wikipedia.
What you are looking at is a dbQwikSite page that I have in our Real Estate test project in which I added a Windows® Live Map. I had created, almost verbatim, the Wikipedia definition of a MashUp. The listing data is all in the dbQwikSite Real Estate database, but the Map is pulled in from Microsoft. After copying sample code from the Live Maps interactive SDK and fiddling with the custom code a bit, miracles of miracles I made a MashUp in about 15 minutes.
Wikipedia defines a mash up as:
Mashup (web application hybrid)
In technology, a mashup is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool; an example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data, thereby creating a new and distinct web service that was not originally provided by either source.
Before I say anything more let me show you are screen shot of something I was playing with in dbQwikSite before I looked up the term in Wikipedia.
What you are looking at is a dbQwikSite page that I have in our Real Estate test project in which I added a Windows® Live Map. I had created, almost verbatim, the Wikipedia definition of a MashUp. The listing data is all in the dbQwikSite Real Estate database, but the Map is pulled in from Microsoft. After copying sample code from the Live Maps interactive SDK and fiddling with the custom code a bit, miracles of miracles I made a MashUp in about 15 minutes.
Well that’s not all, check this out. I made this over two months ago, when I was testing Developer Edition. This page uses Google Charts APIs to produce graphs of a data page generated by dbQwikSite. 
Here’s another graph… ok, so it’s not a “true” MashUp by definitions. It is using Microsoft’s Siverlight 2 technology which is not a web service, but I didn’t have to know anything about coding graphs, just enough to call the JavaScripts and pass the right parameters. It’s just so pretty, I could not resist showing it off.
So today, it dawned on me, I was creating MashUps and I didn’t even know it. At first I said to myself “Naw, it can’t be that easy, MashUps are the realm of web gurus. I must be missing something.” So off to Wikipedia I went, to delve into the real meaning of MashUps. I stopped reading after I read the example I quoted earlier. “Wow! This is cool!” I thought to myself. There’s something big going on here, code generation plus MashUps what an awesome, powerful combination.
By themselves these web services like Google Charts and Windows Maps are interesting. But they only become valuable when placed within a meaningful context. Let’s face it you are much more interested in a map to the new house you are going to buy than just “a map”. And you are likely much more interested in a plot of your sales than a graph of data that is not yours.
What MashUp developers do is take all these nice “gadgets” and knit them into an application to enhance their applications. These guys are the guys writing the back end processing, digging data out of their databases and integrating these fantastic web services to enrich their web applications. But, wait a minute; dbQwikSite users know that they don’t have to code the back end. The code generator of dbQwikSite does that for you. So we just made the job of creating MashUp web sites magnitudes easier. Let dbQwikSite churn out the back end code and a basic interface then add a few lines of custom code to call web services and we are making MashUps in the blink of an eye.
While I still think that MashUp is a funny term, I do agree that the concept is valid and very powerful. Even more powerful is when you marry that technology to the dbQwikSite code generation technology to web services technology in MashUps. You can produce some pretty advanced websites at lighting speeds by “Mashing it Up” with dbQwikSite.
By themselves these web services like Google Charts and Windows Maps are interesting. But they only become valuable when placed within a meaningful context. Let’s face it you are much more interested in a map to the new house you are going to buy than just “a map”. And you are likely much more interested in a plot of your sales than a graph of data that is not yours.
What MashUp developers do is take all these nice “gadgets” and knit them into an application to enhance their applications. These guys are the guys writing the back end processing, digging data out of their databases and integrating these fantastic web services to enrich their web applications. But, wait a minute; dbQwikSite users know that they don’t have to code the back end. The code generator of dbQwikSite does that for you. So we just made the job of creating MashUp web sites magnitudes easier. Let dbQwikSite churn out the back end code and a basic interface then add a few lines of custom code to call web services and we are making MashUps in the blink of an eye.
While I still think that MashUp is a funny term, I do agree that the concept is valid and very powerful. Even more powerful is when you marry that technology to the dbQwikSite code generation technology to web services technology in MashUps. You can produce some pretty advanced websites at lighting speeds by “Mashing it Up” with dbQwikSite.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Rave Review from Bangkok Post
This Wednesday, then I opened my morning paper I was pleasantly surprised to find that Thailand's largest newspaper had done a review of dbQwikSite by their resident Web Design columnist. It's quite a positive review so I thought I would share it with you.
Read the full review here. (updated link Jun 9 2008)
Here are a few kudos from the article: (in the event that the above link gets "retired")
I do not normally get excited about a code generation tool but I have watched this local product evolve and it just keeps getting better.
Remember this is a local Thai product that rivals the bigger US equivalents and is of course a lot less expensive
If you are looking for a deceptively inexpensive web site builder and don't want to pay someone to build one for you then I recommend that you try dbQwikSite.
If you are wondering: No I'm not on the board or payroll - this is just a great product.
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